


All Loose Things

by pendragonness



Series: All Loose Things [1]
Category: Black Sails
Genre: First Kiss, Flint is exhausted, M/M, Repressed Feelings, Silver is gentle, because we all need some soft nice things in this show right now, cause those are my favourite, soft!pirates
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-26
Updated: 2017-03-26
Packaged: 2018-10-10 22:09:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,016
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10448628
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pendragonness/pseuds/pendragonness
Summary: “What happened to you, then, Captain? To get you sitting on the deck after midnight, drunk as a luckless gambler?”-Silver finds Flint in a bit of a mood and, well, he's never been one to let things go.





	

**Author's Note:**

> I want to thank Toby Stephens for justifying my writing of this fic with perfect timing, as I can associate it with his quote, "I’m just saying that Flint would find it hard admitting [romantic feelings about Silver] to himself. He has already suffered so much.” Re: my personal interpretation of Flint's possible emotional relationship with Silver is that his fear would prevent anything drastic from happening between them - although that doesn't mean Silver wouldn't try.
> 
> (This is set roughly in the latter end of S3...I honestly drew it up in the span of two slightly busy days so I can't say it's very well detailed in relation to the show's own timeline..)

"All loose things seem to drift down to the sea, and so did I." - Louis L'Amour  
~

“May I just ask: what in the hell are you doing out here?”

The voice, which broke the calm repetition of the ocean and the groans of the ship, did not startle Flint; the thump of a crutch and one heavy footstep had forewarned him enough.

“Trying to be alone,” Flint responded simply, not moving his gaze from the navy darkness of the open sea.

“Well, as I understand it, your quarters tend to be much more private than the open deck of a ship.” Silver limped his way to stand beside Flint, who sat awkwardly flat on his bum on the deck, elbows braced on his knees. Silver peered down and his tone changed. “You all right, Captain?”

“Fine,” The older man muttered, and dropped his head to look down at the wood boards beneath him. Silver waited patiently, knowing this game and how to play it.

Flint ran a hand over his head, then snapped it back up at the sound of a weighty thud from nearby. He and Silver glanced over to see a man changing the watch, having climbed from the nest and jumped down the last few feet. He nodded at them both before melting into the near-darkness.

Flint's dark stare turned back toward Silver. His brows dipped unhappily. “Don't need t'be fuckin' babysat.”

His words slurred just barely too much, and the retort Silver had been ready with stopped in his throat. “Are you drunk?” he asked bluntly.

Flint refused to answer and Silver's white teeth gleamed in the dark.

“Now this is something.”

“Fuck off,” Flint growled, settling to stare out at the sea again.

Never one to do as told, nor let sleeping dogs – drunkenly – lie as they were, Silver thumped forward another half-step.

“What happened to you, then? To get you sitting on the deck after midnight, drunk as a luckless gambler?”

Flint made it clear he wasn't to be the talkative type when intoxicated and his stony silence fell heavily between the men. Through the mess of rum in his blood, he battled with himself whether to give the younger man another 'fuck off', or relent to the comfort of keeping him close. Despite Silver's habit of running his mouth far too much and too often, sometimes his voice was not unpleasant, and his company not unwanted. And those notions made Flint sick – sick with himself and this goddamned fate he couldn't shake.

Silver shifted, paying more attention to the way his captain held himself – bowed over, collapsed, exhausted. The quartermaster put aside the mirth and found he looked upon Flint with concern instead.

“Is something the matter?”

Flint sighed, heavy and from the deepest part of his chest. When he spoke, his voice was a raspy, defeated whisper. “Can't sleep.” Silver waited. “Nightmares.”

Silver hesitated, looking toward the hidden ocean Flint was staring at in the darkness. Mulling something over in his mind for just a beat, he pushed again: “Charlestown?” he asked, gentle as he could manage. He didn't dare say her name, not with Flint in this state.

“Everything,” came the reply, followed by a hesitating, “Everyone.”

“Everyone?” Silver wasn't fast enough to stop his own mouth sometimes, and winced. To cover it, his mistake of being nosy and _concerned_ , he reached down to awkwardly pull with his free arm at Flint's shoulder. He got a hold of fabric and pulled up, not effectively, but to get the message across. “Come on, Cap, let's get you off the deck. Up.”

Flint did as told and stumbled up, losing a step just barely with the rock of the boat, and then seeming steady enough. He'd caught hold of Silver's sleeve when the younger man tried to haul him to his feet and now he stood looking blankly toward the deck and without releasing his grip.

“Everyone,” he mumbled, and his voice was haunted.

Silver struggled to catch Flint's gaze, barely able to find it in the darkness, but he could see the distress in every line of the man's drawn face. Silver nodded sympathetically. “I know,” was all he could find to say in reply, fully aware that he absolutely did not know anything at all.

Flint stared at him for a long moment – too long, perhaps, or in a different way maybe; it was hard to discern in the moonlight and drunken haze. But then Flint pulled away and blinked, his brows did something almost quizzical, and he made to walk away from Silver without a word.

“Captain-” Silver called, reaching for the tipsy man again, with real concern now.

“I'm going to my quarters,” Flint's response was gruff once more.

“I'll walk you-”

“It's a fucking ship, Silver, not some country estate.”

And that was that. Flint's boots thudded steadily enough as he strode away, and he left Silver to wallow in the moonlight.

 

-

 

When a bold knock came through Flint's cabin door, the only response he had for it was a firm “No”. The door opened anyway, Silver letting himself in with the surety of someone who believed he had a special place in the captain's company, even if he had just been resoundingly told otherwise.

“Better now?” Silver asked plainly from the threshold, watching the captain before he limped in.

Flint sat at his desk, one elbow propped up, his forehead resting in the palm of his hand as though exhausted, or perhaps in discomfort, or both. Two empty bottles of rum sat on the edge of the desk.

“Thought I told you to fuck off.”

“Yes but that was hours ago,” Silver challenged good-naturedly, although the tease didn't reach his careful eyes, which were locked on his captain. "Thought I'd find you sleeping it off."

“I'm sober now, if that's what you're concerned about,” Flint growled.

“Actually I can't say it is.”

“The fuck do you want, then?”

A rare stretch of silence fell, and the surprise of it caused Flint to raise his head from his hand, expecting more fast, witty remarks instead of quiet. He met Silver's gaze and his own green eyes were hard and defensive; Silver, meanwhile, looked alarmingly...vulnerable.

“Well?”

“To be honest, Captain, I came to see if you're alright.”

“I'm fine,” the response was quick, a knee-jerk.

“Somehow, I'm not entirely reassured.”

There was another tense moment of silence as the men silently battled each other, will against will, gazes unwavering. Flint was ashamed of the state he'd been in on the deck, in plain view of anyone on the crew, and ashamed of his reasons why. And he was furious at his own shame.

Silver broke the quiet by shuffling closer to the captain's desk, his crutch drawing especial attention in the stillness of everything else.

“You can sit, if you'd like,” Flint spoke without thinking, not even glancing at the missing leg, proving that he didn't make the offer out of pity but rather simple awareness.

The edge of Silver's mouth flickered with a smile. “So much for wanting me out,” he teased, but softly. He saw that nothing in Flint's posture said he wanted to left alone, and the way he had held onto Silver on the deck seemed of brutal importance now.

“I want you to talk to me,” Silver declared, his open gaze shifting from concern to determination. He didn't take the offer to sit.

Flint bristled for a moment – reflex, again – but then his gaze fell, and with it went the hard lines in his face. “Just let me grieve,” He said the words like a sigh.

“You don't have to do it alone,” Silver answered, and he seemed unaware of his body shifting a half-step forward again, pressing into the side of the desk. He spoke carefully, intentionally. “You do not have to do these things alone.”

“This isn't a debate.”

“I damn well want it to be!” The snap in Silver's tone forced Flint to look up at him, his eyes a little harder than they'd been before, wary at the other man's boldness. Silver looked fired up now, impatient and determined, no longer softly prodding. “We're partners in this, this..whatever is happening, this war on England and all of civilization. I thought we'd agreed on that. And I sure as hell don't feel good about things between us if I have no idea what kind of mental state you're in.”

“I'm in no state-”

“Drunk and suicidal, seem likely,” Silver retorted with what was nearly a snarl. He had certainly lost his tolerance.

Flint only curled his lip and looked away. Silver wanted to scream with frustration.

“Fucking _talk_ to me,” he demanded. “Grieve all you want, but you're going to drive yourself mad like this. I know I can't understand what Miranda was to you but-”

“Not just Miranda,” Flint interrupted, and his words came as a defeated rush.

Silver stopped the tirade he was prepared for, his shoulders tense. He waited.

“It's not just about Miranda...mostly it is her, but not..” Flint paused, still leaning over his desk, now staring at a spot he scratched at with a nail. He was so tired, so sick and tired and ready to share something, with someone. “Gates is there sometimes, in the nightmares. And...others. So many others.” He stopped again, voice thick, chest tight with the desire to shout it all out, but suffocating under the fear of exposure that had been so long instilled in his being.

Flint raised his eyes, slowly, heavily, up to meet Silver's face. The look he found on the other man's dark features struck him deeply: a foreign and unexpected expression of caring, and concern. A willingness to take whatever answer Flint gave him and try to understand it. Flint wondered if now was the time to say what haunted him the most, if this was his chance to remove a small amount of the damning weight that lay upon his shoulders for the past ten years. But no – he looked away.

“I have been the cause of so much pain and death, and always to those most undeserving of it. And I'm exhausted.”

The cabin was quiet in wake of Flint's confession. Boards creaked against the strain of the ocean but the rest of the night was peaceful, only the men's own breath and heartbeats there to keep them company.

The room felt too tight, the very air full of electricity and something Flint was almost afraid of – a tension, a possibility, he didn't want to address.

“Look at me,” Silver's low voice broke the silence, and almost as an afterthought, he added a timid, “Please.”

It took every ounce of his will to do so, to lift his head just barely, to flick his eyes to the side and up a little, to give Silver what he'd asked for, and yet Flint managed. He saw a dark, melancholy face shrouded by the curls of long hair and a scrappy beard, and most importantly, blue eyes that reminded him of the sky above a becalmed ocean.

Flint watched Silver move, he saw the reach of the younger man's arm and the outstretched fingers, but still he flinched when those fingers touched against his cheek – feather-light for a moment, and then a gentle warmth that cradled his face. Flint blinked heavily once, twice, then let his eyes stay shut as he remembered being touched like this so long ago, by another man in another life. Everything within him grieved.

Silver's thumb stroked carefully against his jaw, scratching through his unkempt beard but soothing as it did so. Flint was unaware of turning into the touch, he only knew he was exhausted and now he finally felt like resting.. The finger that stroked gently across his bearded cheek reached further, the warm palm cradling his face as the thumb dared to trace across his lower lip-

Flint snapped back, eyes flying open and body pulling away, out of Silver's touch – but Silver was firm in his resolve and leaned forward, one hand braced on the edge of the desk, the other on the arm of Flint's chair, trapping the older man in.

Silver stared down at his captain sitting inches beneath him, he studied the nervous, defensive hold in Flint's shoulders and the way Flint's eyes finally revealed something secret and personal. Silver knew he had a similar look on his face, too. He was just as nervous, and more overwhelmed than Flint would likely believe, as this scenario that was playing out felt like something he'd dreamed up months earlier: something absurd and impossible and that had never deserved real consideration.

He leaned down, carefully and very, very slowly, pale blue eyes never leaving his captain's face.

When Silver was close enough for his breath to ghost over Flint's forehead and nose, Flint's eyes slipped shut, his body tense enough to be almost trembling. Silver himself struggled not to tremble or shake, to give away nothing of his own fears and desires, but to comfort Flint of his own. Even when he was close enough for their noses to bump – Flint flinched at the sensation and Silver's stomach twisted with sympathy – Silver still watched, his eyes heavy and lips already feeling the brush of Flint's mustache.

Silver kissed Flint gently, more gently than he could remember ever kissing before. Dry lips met carefully, just a warm press together, and Silver still watched the face of the man beneath him, trying to read every minute flicker of expression: the small knot between his brows, the resolute stillness of his closed eyes. The young quartermaster drew back half an inch, letting his nose drag across Flint's cheekbone, and received a satisfactory shift from the man. Silver kissed him again, mouth open further, desperate to encourage his captain. His blood was burning him in his veins, nerves pumped his heart double-time, his skin felt suddenly clammy in the close air of the cabin. And still, Flint's response was limited.

Silver stopped his attempted ministrations and pulled away, far enough to look levelly at his captain, but not enough to relinquish his insistence on the matter.

“Captain,” he murmured, letting his voice stay low and soft.

Flint opened his eyes, guarded already.

“I'm asking you not to hide from me,” Silver soothed, and he reached up with a hand again to brush at the side of Flint's face. He openly let his gaze trace over the older man's features, following the movement of his fingers. “It's all right.”

Finally, Flint reached up to lay his hand over Silver's, knotting his fingers in-between the quartermaster's. Silver's pulse stuttered and he took the moment eagerly, pushing his mouth down again to meet his lips with Flint's, this time finding Flint waiting.

This kiss was warmer, more real, Flint trying to give back to Silver what he craved – interest, want, affection. Flint's fingers slid away from Silver's and across his cheek, threading into his hair and soon gripping a knot of it at the back of the younger man's neck. While his body burned with desire, his kiss was still careful with nerves. Silver tilted his head a little more, slanting his mouth against Flint's all the more deeply, and finally dared to lick lazily against Flint's own teeth and tongue.

Flint shifted again and a rumble rose from his chest, sounding both like surprise and pleasure. His free hand rose to make a fist in the shoulder of Silver's jacket, and soon the quartermaster was locked fiercely against his captain.

Silver twisted his mouth away with a soft gasp. Everything in him was thrumming with overwhelming contentment. “I can feel,” he breathed, watching Flint's open mouth, noting how their breath shared in the inch of space between them, “I can feel you holding back, Captain. Don't,” Silver whispered, and licked casually at Flint's lower lip before smothering him with a deep kiss again. He could taste the edge of rum still on Flint's tongue, and the man's mouth was hot and sweet and rich. The hands in his hair and jacket twisted and pulled. Flint's chest heaved beneath him even while his kisses remained timid, suppressed.

The restrained want Silver could feel trembling through the man he touched drove him crazy – and hit him with a painful melancholy. Always, he saw and felt something beneath the surface of Flint, something in glances and inflections that wasn't right and it wore down his own soul. Before, Silver had been oblivious to his own observations and what it might mean for him. Now, he was vibrantly aware. There was exhaustion and pain and anger and grief in Flint, and Silver cared enough to desperately want to alleviate his captain's maladies, for what time he could.

“Don't do this to yourself, James,” Silver whispered.

Flint's eyes flew open, wide, fleetingly vulnerable, and then he was guarded again – would that look never leave him? He stared at Silver for a long moment, mouth suddenly turned in a tight frown. The hand slid out of Silver's long curls to rest on the arm of his chair, his other hand following suit. Silver swallowed and leaned back, shifting the lone right leg he leaned his weight on, only now aware of the screaming of his muscles since he had dropped the crutch.

“What are you doing?” Flint's voice was as wicked as a blade, defenses struggling to raise again.

Silver met Flint's gaze firmly – discreetly using a hand to steady himself against the desk and relieve some of the weight from his leg – and prayed he looked as confident as he imagined.

“Exactly what I want, Captain,” Silver answered smoothly, daring to play the fingertips of his left hand across the knuckles that clutched the arm of Flint's chair. He watched his own touch for a moment, then flicked his pale eyes up coyly at the captain, finishing his sentence without speaking a word: _you._

Now Flint swallowed and the hard light within his eyes faded, until his face took on that beaten look of anguished defeat that Silver had begun to find more often, and always dread. Back to square one, Silver laid his hand against Flint's jaw again, scratching his thumb briefly through the coarse red beard, and then leaning down. This time, Flint raised up his mouth to meet him for the kiss, and now it was warm and pressing and accepting.

Silver pushed harder, until his teeth scraped against Flint's, and he wrapped a hand around the back of Flint's neck to keep their kiss so deep. Silver wanted Flint's tongue in his mouth, wanted his teeth to press against Flint's skin, wanted to hear Flint moan and sigh.

He found himself grabbed at, Flint now pulling at both his shoulders and tugging him toward his own chest and lap. Silver resisted, not removing his mouth from its hungry exploration, but refusing to wind up on Flint's lap – conscious of his missing leg and uneasy. What he didn't expect was for Flint to shove up and into him instead, standing and forcing Silver back against the desk, close enough for Flint to roughly lift him onto the edge of the furniture, which is exactly what he did.

Silver grunted happily, and, feeling Flint's lips smile against his own, found himself grinning too. “This is much better,” he muttered, allowing Flint to stand in between his legs, his crotch rubbing against the captain's firm thigh. Silver swallowed.

Whatever Flint had been trying so hard to repress was breaking through, slowly, but enough for him to finally match Silver's mouth; his tongue drug hotly against the inside of Silver's bottom lip, followed by his teeth, and immediately with his tongue again, pushing and licking. Silver licked back, and both the men sighed at the sensation, Flint's chest shaking with the weight of his own pleasure. He shoved in closer, feeling Silver's stomach against him, the growing hardness between his legs. Silver squirmed and Flint ran a heavy, caressing hand up his thigh.

“Oh, Christ-” Silver panted and trembled, then struggled to compose himself when he felt Flint tense up again.

Silver kissed at Flint's throat, one hand still cradling the man's jaw, the other pulling his shirt free of his breeches. Flint's pulse raced against his lips and tongue, as Silver slowly sucked and kissed down the muscles of his neck, to his collarbone, where Silver found himself nuzzling into the man's faintly freckled chest, revealed only a little at the low, open collar of his shirt.

“You're incredible,” Silver whispered against the man's skin, hot breath against hot flesh, and Flint shivered at the sensation.

“John, I-” Flint stopped just as he'd barely begun, and Silver looked up at him in surprise, hearing his name, but the older man only swallowed and struggled to hold his gaze, uncertain and unsteady once more.

“Kiss me again,” Silver instructed softly, and Flint did as told. He caressed a palm past Silver's temple, over his hair, and this time delicately threaded his fingers into the mess of curls as he pressed his mouth against Silver's. Flint held the kiss still for a moment, long and sweet and deep, whatever emotions he struggled with coming through in his connection with Silver.

Silver stroked his hand across Flint's chest for just a moment, then began to tug the edges of his own shirt out of his breeches. Flint soon understood and broke the languid kiss in order to help pull Silver's shirt over his head, mussing up the mass of dark curls even more.

At the removal of Silver's shirt, Flint only sighed heavily, almost wistfully, something Silver couldn't help but note with a smirk of satisfaction. He ran his hands up Flint's stomach beneath the shirt, feeling the faint ridges of scars, the firm panes of his chest. Flint tangled both hands in his hair – it was becoming a habit – and nuzzled against his bearded jaw, sighing again.

Flint kissed just underneath the the hinge of his jaw, earning a squirm from Silver, and then mouthed at his throat while his hands roamed around his muscled shoulders, to his biceps, down to his smooth chest and stomach. Silver shivered and panted at the sensations, aching with the want to feel Flint's bare body on his own.

“Captain,” he breathed, he pleaded, Flint's flirty, wandering hands and teasing mouth rapidly stealing all authority Silver had in the situation. He shoved his body closer into Flint's touch, and in turn felt the hardness of the other man against his groin. Without a thought, Silver's fingers fluttered to Flint's breeches and began tugging at the laces.

Flint stilled, his forehead resting on Silver's bare shoulder, his hands holding onto the man's smooth waist. The apprehension was back: it changed his breathing, his posture.

“I want to-” Silver murmured as he pulled a the breeches, trying to be reassuring, aware enough again to be careful of whatever he was dealing with, “I want- if it wasn't for this fucking _leg_ , I'd- God, James, I'd use my mouth on you, I want to taste-”

“Silver,” Flint interrupted, his voice low, but soft, so soft. Tired. He hadn't moved an inch from where he leaned into and onto the smaller man. 

“It's alright,” Silver found himself whispering into the man's ear, nuzzling his chin against the close-shaven head that rested on his shoulder. “I want to do this for you, I want to taste you, James, and have you-”

“I can't,” Flint argued simply, and without moving his head away from the protection of Silver's shoulder, his hands removed the younger man's fingers from his breeches and brought them slowly to rest on the desk on each side of Silver's legs.

Flint kissed Silver's bare shoulder then, in something like an apology, and his beard tickled the smooth golden skin and sent a shiver up Silver's spine. Flint pulled away to look him in the eye and Silver found that the exhausted sadness had returned. His stomach clenched with despair – he had done no good, after all. Perhaps he'd only made things worse, whatever those things may be.

“I'm sorry,” Flint surprised him with an honest apology, his words as bare as the expression on his tired face, “but...I can't, not yet. I need you to understand.” Silver stared, soaking in the warmth of Flint's closeness while he had it, and hoping his face didn't betray what he felt.

“I can assure you, I don't understand a bloody thing,” Silver retorted, although his tone was light. At the flicker of panicked distress in Flint's pale eyes, he smiled faintly and kissed the taller man lightly on the chin. Flint offered a weak smile in return and ducked his head back down to Silver's shoulder, to kiss the warm skin.

“I'm sorry,” he breathed again, and his arms enveloped Silver as he sunk back into his chair.

“Don't you dare,” Silver responded, still perched on the desk, but now with Flint's arms firm around his hips, head rested against his thigh, shoulders slack in defeat.

Silver looked down at his captain, not with pity, but with an empathy that drove into his own chest. He feared he would never understand what had just happened or why it happened the way it did, and feared he would never have answers for all the questions James Flint presented. Silver feared things would only get worse from here, that perhaps this had been the absolute wrong move to make – but it had felt right, and felt good, and it seemed that Flint, of all people, could understand.

“Thank you,” Flint murmured into Silver's thigh, and his breath was heavy, his words slow and tired. Silver realized his captain was about to fall asleep sitting in his desk chair, his head resting in the quartermaster's lap, and Silver also realized there was no chance he was going to move away.

 

-

 

Some time later – it might have been a quarter of an hour, or a full one, it was hard to say – Flint shifted, disturbing Silver's slightly cramped peace, from where he leaned back on his hands and braced his shoulders, still forced to sit upright on the edge of the desk with Flint's head on his thigh. Flint stirred out of his sleep - or his mute stillness, whatever it had been - and his hands skittered carefully around Silver's bare back, then slipped away and he pushed himself back to a proper sitting position.

Flint rubbed at his face, scratched his knuckles over the bristles on his chin, and glanced quickly up at Silver, who watched with a lazy ease.

“You alright?” Flint asked, and Silver raised his brows.

“You're asking me that?”

Flint grunted and with it, Silver could see the windows shutting and the locks closing: the captain putting his defenses back into place. Flint stood, only a little stiffly, and drew close to Silver again, causing the dark-haired man to catch his breath for just a second. But Flint was only helping him down from the desk, and handed over his rumpled shirt and the discarded crutch – a discreet dismissal.

Silver tugged the shirt back over his head, leaning against the desk to do so, then swallowed and accepted the instrument, tucking it under his arm and shifting his uneven weight. His actions were sharp and quick, suddenly annoyed with himself, with the handicap, with the pain of it, with Flint's stubbornness, with everything that had passed through the night. He limped a step to adjust his balance and dared glance at Flint, unable to stop himself.

The taller man was more resolute now, some of his usual stern lines back in his face, but still he wore an air of tired grief. Silver felt the breath in his chest like a pain, and wondered if he would soon be wearing Flint's grief too. He turned to go.

Something caught the edge of his loose shirt, and Silver glanced down reflexively – it was Flint's hand, carefully, almost delicately, holding on to the fabric. Silver didn't raise his head, his entire body aching in a frightening way, and instead he leaned into the warmth of Flint's chest, so close the man's breath grazed warm against his ear.

Silver sagged into the comfort of Flint's firm chest, pressing his forehead and nose against the man's collarbone, feeling just the slight tickle of the man's chest hair on his cheek. Flint did not wrap his arms around Silver again, he didn't do anything so obvious or so bold, not anymore, instead he simply let the quartermaster find reassurance in his closeness as they leaned against each other, and used the stroking of his hand through Silver's hair as both another apology and a show of gratitude.

The men stayed close for a long, warm moment, Silver now being the one to rest and feel comforted, and Flint finding a flicker of peace with the casual caresses he was able to bestow. He tucked his chin against Silver's temple for a moment, just a brief nuzzle of affection, and then delicately pulled himself away. Silver, relinquishing his closeness to the captain with no small amount of remorse, understood.

He did not meet Flint's eyes again or look back as he thumped toward the cabin door. He did not hesitate before letting himself out and shutting the door behind him. He did not pause for a single step until he was back in his own rooms, and forced to confront the tension in his chest. Whatever had happened, had happened, and it was over. There were other matters of concern on this ship and in their lives and ones that needed his attention fully.

Silver sighed, seeing the future perfectly clearly: this would not be discussed, it would not be a regular occurrence, it was a comfort they would both remember and feel often, but it would be buried when the sun rose and no one would ever know it had existed at all.

**Author's Note:**

> This can be followed up with 'These Drowning Men Do Drown', just for the sake of some actual intimacy between the two, because I frustrated myself as well as Silver by letting this end the way it did...


End file.
